The former finance manager of a Walnut Creek charity serving area youth has been sentenced to 27 months in prison for siphoning off over $1.6 million from the organization, federal prosecutors said Wednesday.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of California said in a press release that Carrie Lynn Grant, 62, of Pleasant Hill took money from the charity and deposited it into her own account – spending the cash on Golden State Warriors tickets, box seats for a San Francisco 49ers game, first-class air travel, and a condominium in Hawaii.
Grant created dummy accounts to cover her fraudulent withdrawals from Junior Achievement of Northern California, according to investigators, embezzling funds between November 2017 and June 2023.
Grant was indicted by a federal grand jury in July 2024 and pleaded guilty to one count of wire fraud in August.
In addition to the prison term, Judge Martínez-Olguín also sentenced Grant to a three-year period of supervised release. The Court will determine the amount of restitution Grant must pay at a later date. She will begin serving the sentence on March 9, 2026.
This never-ending greed needs to stop. There are ways to try to prevent this. Like oversight and two signatures required. In God we trust. All others are under intense scrutiny.
It’s all about the kids. And those court side tix of course.
That theft averages $290K a year, every year, for 5 and 1/2 years. That’s pretty hard to miss.
Shame on the governing board.